


When you return, go to the sea

by magical_realism27



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Friendship, Gen, Pre slash I guess?, Romantic Friendship, implied depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-26
Updated: 2013-07-26
Packaged: 2017-12-21 09:38:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/898763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magical_realism27/pseuds/magical_realism27
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Allison likes to pretend. Lydia likes to pounce.<br/>***</p><p>Set between seasons 2 and 3, Lydia and Allison spend the summer making a habit out of having sleep overs and feigning normalcy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When you return, go to the sea

**Author's Note:**

> The title is taken from the song Fish by Wye Oak. I never write teen wolf, I have no idea what's gotten into me. 
> 
> Written on an iPad, sorry for formatting errors, I don't own the show, blah blah.

Allison likes to pretend.

She likes going to the mall, buying soft pretzels for her and Lydia. She likes date night and slumber parties, birthdays and graduations. She lets Lydia flat iron her hair, lets her try out her new blue mascara (she looks like a clown and her lashes clump together.) She looks like a stranger. Allison pockets the tube while Lydia is still trembling with laughter. 

Lydia always stops by her house every Friday night, always drawling out a flippant "Hey, Mr. Argent." Before flopping onto Allison's bed, one creamy leg drooped over the side of her comforter, foot planted on her hard, shiny floor.

Allison noticed Lydia's predilection towards the hard and shiny.

"I went shopping today." Lydia announces proudly, always proudly.  
"I can see." Allison smirks into the glowing face of her laptop. Allison never looks up when Lydia enters her room, and they've cultivated a routine. Lydia flops and flails and rambles about something, anything, trivial and bubble gum flavored. Allison fidgets around her room, not nervous, but careful. 

"I got the same jacket in two different colors, I know how that irks you, but I figured that the colors were far enough apart on the color wheel to convey completely different things. A day look and a night one. " 

Allison smiles inwardly and picks at a split end. She loses herself in-not thought- but maybe the absence of thought. Memories or fantasies or imagery. The silence must have ebbed into awkward territory, because Lydia snaps her gum and purses her lips. 

"Yellow and purple." She expands. "The colors of the jackets. Asymmetrical cut."  
"Sounds cute." Allison replies. Lydia has grown accustom to her short answers, deriving that any perceived coldness from Allison was a defense, a survival technique, and Lydia was nothing if not well versed in those. The only unnerving aspect was that she couldn't deduce if it was an exercise of fight or flight response. As she studies Allison at her desk, gazing out her bedroom window, she decides she can not picture Allison running from something, anything, only towards, always towards. But, as Allison presses her lips together and let them open absentmindedly, Lydia wondered if her friend's persona is duplicitous, all peacock feathers, and hand tricks, distractions. A kind of "look over there" tactic before she pounces, shredding her prey. 

***

"You want to rent a movie tonight?" Allison hums through her teeth. Lydia nods, rooting through her numerous shopping bags to locate her absolutely luscious new leather boots. "What kind?" She inquires, distractedly.

"Anything with a happy ending." Allison decides after moments of contemplation.

Lydia lets out a laugh, sharp and dangerous, like daggers (like claws). She tames her aching lips and glances at Allison, who's face has contorted into something brittle and used. She chuckles, hollow and used up and tragic. 

Allison likes to pretend. Lydia likes to pounce. 

"The guy gets the girl, the underdogs win the big game, the bad guys get their comeuppance." Allison doesn't know who she's talking to, Lydia doesn't know if she's listening. 

"It's all trite, isn't it? Happy endings are farcical and generic, and sad endings, sad endings are deep and meaningful." Lydia laments to the silence. 

"Let's watch a classic." Allison decides. "Classics are classics for a reason." Lydia steals a glance, and Allison's face is even now, calm and smooth again. 

Away, always, always away. 

Flight. 

Lydia decides, three quarters into Casablanca, and four cartons of milk duds later. Even the most powerful weapons in the world miss the target when you're running away, down hill, on wet grass. 

***

Lydia dreams of bloodied feet as she drifts between alert and unconscious. Black clothing, cross bows, and bits of grass.

Allison dreams of summer that night. Allison dreams of lip pencils, spray tans, top 40 techno hits. She imagines cyan colored pools with yellow lights at the bottom, barbecued chicken, denim shorts with the legs uneven, because she had cut her favorite pair in an act of brazen ingenuity. 

When she finds the shorts again, in late November, because her dad hadn't done the laundry in weeks, crumpled under her snow pants and a one piece, she remembers that it was really Kate, who cut them up, and not her.

But in her dream, it had been her.

***

The sun laves over the morning, burning pink and gold, wantonly warm as it seeps through Allison's cracked blinds.From the bed, Lydia almost snarls at it as she wakes, her feet plopped next to Allison's, lined up like soldiers, her head resting in the crook of Allison's neck,and her collar doused in sweat, primal. Lydia shifts, trying to regain comfort, as she had fallen asleep in her most coveted chiffon dress, notably one of the least forgiving fabrics, and notably her favorite. Her heels are still on, the highest, pinkest pair she owns. Her movement startles Allison, who wakes like a burst, all at once, headphones still tangled in her hair. She pulls them out of her computer with unabashed malice. 

"So, breakfast?" Lydia questions as a greeting. 

Allison likes pancakes, she decides, as her dad starts the third batch, throwing in blueberries and chocolate chips sporadically. She likes pancakes, and scrambled eggs, granite countertops and the dust that settles in sun beams. She likes movie theaters and diet coke. She likes swimming pools but not the ocean. 

Or maybe it's the other way around.

She likes lists. 

She likes that she can think in lists now.In short, controlled bursts. 

She likes the feel of velvet and the smell of vanilla. She likes Lydia, likes the way her red hair gets coppery and mussy in the morning. She likes Lydia's makeup bag full of colorful products, the kind that do the thinking for you.  
Sitting in the kitchen, on the high chair near the counter top, Allison considers adding her father to her list. But she doesn't like listing the things she isn't sure of. 

Lydia is the only person that makes it onto her list.

***

"You have amazing cheekbones." Lydia would always say to Allison as she applied blush to them. Creamy, peachy shades. Allison would smile and shake her head involuntarily, and then Lydia would huff and reach for the makeup wipes. But then Allison's mom died, and Lydia stopped saying it. 

Lydia stopped saying, Allison stopped thinking, they both had stopped doing. 

"I'm going away at the end of the summer, my dads taking us both on a vacation." Allison had announced in June. 

"Then I'm sleeping over every night until you leave." Lydia said like that was that.

And it was. 

But it was everything.

***


End file.
